All I know about pimping is that apparently it isn't easy. Somehow WoTC have circumvented that age old law of the track and made it so other pimps can't knock their hoes off and put them in their stable. There are people all over the world right now who have girls "out there making the rest of my money" that would love to know their secret.

I thought 4th Edition was the fastest-selling RPG product of all time or something. Had it been any good, it might have been huge. With all the attention paid to Lord Gygax's untimely passing last year and a slew of D&D references and articles in the MSM, there was a real sense that D&D was making a mainstream comeback.

The failure of WotC, I think, was their failure to embrace the campier, more ironic, nostalgic, sort-of-hipster-geeky-coolness that DnD has been developing over the past half decade. 4th Ed didn't aim for twenty and thirty somethings. It had it's sights set firmly on the 'tween set. Mistake.

If they're smart, they'll repackage 4th edition into a format resembling the original 1st edition books. Hate to be shallow, I can't even look at the 4th Edition books.

I get the fact that DDM skirmish is failing (never played it myself).
I get that the cost of making those minis is rising.
What I don't get is why they couldn't just make the minis entirely non-random and let us buy those we want? Not enough money in that?
...and the whole power cards thing just makes me sick.

I know. It's disgusting. I'm leaving this ship before it sinks entirely. I hate to see D&D go, as it surely will going this direction, but there's at least a bright side to this. If D&D fails, then, possibly, lots of gamers that only stuck to D&D will try new systems and boost the rest of the industry. Still, though, it hurts to see it fall apart like this. Especially to end with such shameless greed.